


Wild Strawberries

by wormwood700



Category: The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-17 02:48:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28841883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wormwood700/pseuds/wormwood700
Summary: Sometimes memory is like a two-way mirror. As one looks back, the other looks forward.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	Wild Strawberries

_Come on, nearly there!_

  
Faramir knew he had run out of credibility when Elboron instead stopped completely, folded his insect bitten arms and stared at his boots. The entire posture shouted ‘liar’.  
Time had come to give in. Faramir lifted his son onto his shoulders. For several days now he had been chased by an old memory: a hillside of wild strawberries. Now he was on his way there, driven by an urgency to bring Elboron he didn't quite understand.   
  
They’d been lost in the forest, hungry and happy, his brother and him. A perfect day of freedom; one of the last of his childhood.  
  
Faramir had been prepared for disappointment, but the strawberries still grew like the small scarlet lanterns Boromir and he had devoured in voracious hunger. The sensation of the moment their juicy sweetness hit his tongue had stayed with him ever since.  
  
Faramir picked two straws, thread them carefully with strawberries and gave them to Elboron. The boy accepted the gift solemnly. He sat down in the grass, knees folded and pulled the berries off with great care and put them in his mouth, one by one.  
  
Looking at his son’s dark head, Faramir was overcome by a feeling of almost painful happiness, making has hands shake and his cheeks wet.   
_He was alive...he was back. Here._ _  
_  
In the hot afternoon, through the thinning fabric of memory, he saw two figures, one tall, the other shorter, and heard the distant chime of their voices and their laughter. Then the tallest raised his head, suddenly alert, and turned around until he was facing the direction of Elboron and himself. Faramir felt his brother’s gaze on them, from the other side of the memory.  
  
“When the world is this beautiful it doesn’t matter that we can’t remain,” Faramir whispered, to no-one in particular.  
  
  



End file.
